


Cinderella, Undercover

by dod123



Series: A Narcissist's Love Song [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Humanstuck, I know you must be sick of them, Multi, Zombies, yes it's another zombie apocalypse story
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-01-01
Updated: 2013-03-28
Packaged: 2017-11-23 01:58:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,637
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/616801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dod123/pseuds/dod123
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the living population is less than the living dead, it's important not to leave anyone behind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"FF?"

"Hello? Feferi- do you read me?"

"Please tell me you just have your com turned off."

Nothing but static.

"Shit."

"Equius?"

Static.

"Fuck. Eridan?"

Still nothing. Under normal circumstances you wouldn't have cared what Eridan did to fuck himself over but you were kind of in charge now, so you had to.

"Shit shit shit _shit._ " Your lisp mangles the word badly but you don't have time to bother with your linguistic inabilities.

"Everybody report back to me now. Then drop what you're doing and get back to the Martina immediately."

"Coming." Karkat.

"I'm alive." Vriska.

"Here!" Nepeta.

"Neophyte Redglare reporting to Captain Appleberry-blast." How Terezi can be so joyful you have no idea but part of you thinks that she seriously believes this is just one big LARP.

"TZ, this isn't the time for your shitty formalities. Get back here"

"Yes, sir!" You can hear her cackling before the com dies.

Still no word from Feferi, Eridan, or Equius, which isn't good. On second thought, Gamzee hadn't called in yet either.

"GZ?"

Static.

"Gamzee? Fuck, if you-"

"What, bro? I'm here."

"Jesus, Gamzee. You scared the shit out of me. Answer me next time."

"Sorry bro. Just watching some motherfuckin' miracles unfold."

"Shit."

"Gamzee, are you high right now?"

"Maybe. What's it motherfuckin' matter to you, Solbro?"

"You're in the field! Inebriated in the fucking field! Goddamn it GZ, get your ass back here before you get killed!"

"Don't you worry your pretty little head." Now that you know he's high, it's easier to pick out the signs that he is. The slight slur in his words and how he speaks just a little bit slower. "I'll be back sooner than you can say motherfuckin' 'poof.'"

You sigh and lean back in your office chair. There's nothing you can do now but wait and hope they make it back safely. You still worry.

*

Life was not supposed to turn out like this. You should be in your senior year of highschool, studying, applying for colleges, sneaking out of the house to make out with Aradia. But life has a tendency to do whatever it can to beat your ass. Your curse.

A year ago you were sitting in Mrs. Sweet's English class making jokes with Karkat about the latent homosexual subtext in _A Separate Piece,_ beating Eridan's pallid ass in COD because hating his guts made your victories even sweeter, and staying up till midnight doing your homework. A year ago you and Aradia were fighting about an alcohol induced kiss with Feferi and making it up to her by watching the first three _Indiana Jones_ movies and taking her to the Archaeology Museum.

Then, on a cold and wet day in April, your dad got sick.

So did Karkat's mom... And Aradia's sister, who was a junior at the community college and lived in their basement.

You didn't see the big deal. It was just a cold. They'd get over it.

But they didn't.

Three weeks later, after tricking your parents into your pantry and burning the house down, you and your electronics went to live with Karkat. But first you helped him shoot his mom with the shotgun she kept under her bed in case of intruders. The irony was painful. 

By June, the zombie apocalypse had officially begun.

*

This story, you suppose, starts with a disease. Worse than a virus, the prion is just a mass of protein, hell bent on reproducing. There is only one cure, currently being developed and tested a thousand miles away.

You don't know any of that, though.

You do know that it likes adults best, the infection having started with them and working their way around. They come in through most openings in the human body- the mouth, eyes, cuts, nose, and, you figure, the opposite end of the digestive tract, but you don't want to know how someone would contract it there. Once in, it finds it's way to the brain and multiplies fast. It blocks out all emotions and memories and dulls pain, eating up the space in your head, and turns you into a thoughtless, soulless demon whose only goal is to either pass it on to the rest of humanity or find nutrition from them. This is mostly conjecture, actually. The zombies aren't keen on talking, but it would explain why you had to fend your parents off with a baseball bat.

The prion likes the living and the barely dead. It appears to avoid eating the brain that keeps the body functioning and can seemingly bring people back from the other side. You're sure there's a scientific reason for this but observation is not a top priority.

It started with the adults- your dad, Karkat's mom, Aradia's sister, though it wasn't picky who caught it along the way. Corpses that weren't six feet under or pumped full of preservatives were fair game. You and your friends were all around sixteen at the time it started going around. The only reason you were still alive was because you had been careful. One of the boys in your English class who sat near you and Karkat, an okay kid, knew some shit about computers and had even played Minecraft with you a couple times, had seen where the world was heading and hung himself in his garage only to come back to life and eat his two younger sisters.

The only way to kill them is to sever their heads from their bodies, completely destroy their spinal cord, or incapacitate them. Even then, it doesn't kill the disease, just the person. The prions go on their merry way devouring brain cells until there's nothing left but an empty skull.

*

The intercom crackles to life.

"Kanaya, can you come in here?"

She responds, her voice close to your ear because of the earpiece communicators Equius had helped you rig up. "Right away, Sollux."

A couple minutes later she hurries into your room, what used to be the security office, and asks, "What do you need me to look at?"

"This." You point at the bottom left monitor in the wall of screens in front of you. She peers at the screen.

"I'm sorry, Sollux, but what exactly am I looking at?" she asks after a pause.

"It's a map. The dots represent everybody. There are chips in everyone's earpieces, so I can keep track of you all. See that yellow dot and green dot? That's me and you in the Martina. The grey, teal, light green, blue, and purpley colored dots coming towards us are Karkat, Nepeta, Terezi, Vriska, and Gamzee. I wasn't able to contact FF, ED, or EQ."

"Oh no." There's genuine concern in her voice.

"Yeah. The thing is is that their chips are still on. This pink dot is FF. The purple one is ED and that blue one is Equius. They're all together on the same block, or at least they were."

You can feel Kanaya shifting uncomfortably. You need to get to the point.

"But, but, but, they're up on High Street. I had the videobots looking around there yesterday and for about three blocks it was completely vacant. They could all be alive together!"

"Or they could all be dead together."

"Look, we can't lose three people in one day! We need as many healthy, living bodies as possible. Once everyone gets back, I'm going to have a meeting on rescuing them." You're talking to fast now, tripping over your lisp, and Kanaya, fortunately or not, is one of the few people able to understand you at a time like this.

She places one hand on your shoulder in an effort to be comforting, and she speaks slowly, planning her words carefully.

"Sollux, I am aware that you and Feferi are an 'item,' so to speak, but you need to calm down. I know it must be hard after what happened with Aradia, but sometimes you just need to let go."

"Kanaya, no, shut up. First of all, there's a legitimate chance that they're okay! Secondly, it's none of your business what FF and I do together and even if we are dating, which I am not confirming, I _am_ staying objective about this. Of the three of them, Feferi's probably the least useful, if you don't factor continuing the human race in with our survival. Equius is the one we should be most concerned about getting back alive, because he can lift an ox and build robots. Last of all, I could've saved Aradia if she'd given me the chance, and what the hell did you think you were doing, bringing her up? Cheap shot. Jesus, KN, have you no soul?"

You can tell you're upsetting her, even though she remains composed. And you still haven't asked her what you called her in here for in the first place.

"Look, sorry, we'll vote on it but if it goes according to plan, I'm 83.61, no, one sec, 84.32% positive we can get them back and have nine and a half functioning humans again, because we both know that Gamzee doesn't fucking count."

"Alright, Sollux. If you insist, but don't lose your head. Do you need my help with anything?"

"Well, now that you mention it," you shoot Kanaya a grateful grin, showing what you felt was probably too much of your ghastly teeth, "I'm a bit nervous about their health... not the zombie part, but there's plenty of other crap that could have happened to them. So when we launch the rescue, _if_ we launch the rescue, we need you to be ready at anytime and prepared for the worst. Cuts, broken bones, fever. Do you think we could set up a medical bay? Someplace we can seal off quick if one of them is infected. We'll need to mobilize as fast as possible in that case. We should have some shopping carts with food and water ready if it goes sour. Do you think you can do this?"

"Yes, Sergeant Sollux." She smiles, ruffling you hair and bends down to kiss your forehead.

"Yeah, yeah. No time for sentiment, Medic," you call out as she leaves your room. "And thanks for using another word I can't say!" You grin and turn to the computer screen as your friends, your troops you might as well call them, begin to arrive.

*

You watch the dots on your map until they're close enough to the Martina that you can switch on the security cameras and see them to make sure they're okay.

Karkat and Terezi are the first to get back. They almost always patrol together, because Karkat's afraid that Terezi might get lost. Terezi's blind enough to not be allowed behind the driver's wheel of a car at night so you suppose it's a viable concern, but you still have a nagging suspicion that they just go hide and make out all day. You try to derail that train of thought as quickly as possible, because, even though you've tried to block out all memory of it, you can't forget kissing her in sixth grade during a particularly vicious game of Truth or Dare. You don't want to know what goes on in Nepeta's head. 

Instead of dwelling on the past you try to decipher what's happened to them in the last six hours from the grainy footage. Karkat's sickles, which you and Aradia had bought him from the Renaissance Fair for his fourteenth birthday, don't seem to have blood on them, and Terezi's cane, which you're pretty sure Vriska had bribed Equius into upgrading, is still sheathed. You let out a breath in relief and then hurry to the back door to greet them.

As you get near an overwhelming stench forces you to take to steps back.

"Christ, what is that smell?"

Karkat bristles. "There was a dead dog out on Miller Road."

"What did you do- roll in it?"

"Oh, ha ha ha. You're absolutely hilarious. It was fucking out there for a week at least. Why can't we live north, where there's frost in October?"

You snort.

"Besides, we were over there getting shit you asked for, so technically it's your fault."

"Mission accomplished, by the way." Terezi points to her bulging teal backpack.

"Great. KK, can you go lend Kanaya a hand?"

"Yeah, sure." Karkat stalks off, mumbling something to himself about ever since the end of world came people don't watch their pets closely enough.

You take the backpack from Terezi and wrap an arm around her shoulders. You grin down at her and waggle your eyebrows. "So?"

"What?" After a pause she looks up at you. "Shit, I'm missing a facial cue, aren't I? Damn lighting."

"It's fine, my fault. Sorry." There's a small break during which you feel like an ass for forgetting. Then, waggling your eyebrows again for no reason, you ask, "So, you and Karkat, huh?"

She laughs and you figure she must have realized what you were doing. "Sorry Sollux, that's confidential. But I can tell you that he tastes just like cherries when he blushes."

"Okay, I don't even want to know what you're insinuating. Besides, I have some serious shit to talk to you about since you may as well be second in command around here."

"Who's first- you or Karkat?"

"Look, since there's no way I can answer that without repercussions, let's _not_ stand here gossiping like a bunch of schoolgirls about to get eaten by a monster in a stupid b-rated horror film that a guy would take his girlfriend to to try and scare her into his pants. Even worse is how little of that simile isn't true."

" __Sollux. Get to the point. You're rambling."

You take a deep breath, then rush to say, "Feferi, Eridan, _and_ Equius are all MIA."

 

"Fuck."

"Tell me about it."

"I'll go break the news to Karkat."

"Wait, shit. TZ, don't go, I said that wrong. There's still a chance that they're not dead, or undead, or turned or whatever."

"Jesus, Sollux, you're really great at getting to point about serious topics."

"I know, right? Anyways, I was going to try staging a rescue, and, as Lieutenant General, I'd like your input."

"We totally should if there's a chance, but, and I'm just checking, this wouldn't have anything to do with any repressed compulsions to save Aradia?"

"Holy fucking shit. Do you guys think my life revolves around her?"

"Well, you and she _were_ -"

"Stop."

"And now you and Fef-"

"Shut up."

"And if Feferi is-"

" **NO.** "

"Look, Sollux-"

"Terezi," you say harshly and she stops talking, her jaw snapping up with a click. "Just _stop_ talking. Jesus Christ. It has nothing to do with Feferi or Aradia or that everyone I love is gone, and a whole lot to do with the fact that we might be the last ten humans in North Caroline."

You let out a gasp of air, and all of the anger that you've had been building up leaves with it, leaving you feeling deflated and empty. "Why the hell is everybody so obsessed about what happened to Aradia, anyways?"

"Never mind. You're right, we should rescue them. Do you have a plan yet?

"No, so I could really use your help."

"I will, but I need to know what information we have."

"Come into my office and we'll find out."


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For some reason Ao3 decided that I wrote and posted the first chapter last January and the only solution I could think of was to post the second.

The good thing about Terezi is that even with the lights on, she can't see that your room's a mess. She can smell it though, and you can tell because even though she doesn't say anything, her nose scrunches up and the corners of her lips turn down. You guide her over to the computer screens and sit her down in your office chair.

"So, today I sent Eridan, Equius, and Feferi down High Street to go see if the community garden by Townhall has anything salvageable."

"We have a community garden?" Terezi sounds incredulous.

"Turns out. So they all took different paths but they got there around the same time and they started walking back together."

"Wait- how do you know this?"

"There are trackers in everyone's communicators."

"That's kind of creepy."

"Well, how do you think I can help you guys when you run into a zombie and need directions or someone to save you? Against your better beliefs, I'm not a magician. Anyways, around three they stop somewhere between Rust Ridge and Carpenter on Main stree. The map doesn't zoom in much. I just figured they found something useful, or needed a break. I always call everyone around four to check up, and I figured I'd call them first since they were all together. I didn't get a response from any of them.

"What are we going to do? How are we going to find them?"

"While everybody is getting back, I was going to move the videobots down there to see if I could find them myself." You glance over to the map. "Shit, Nepeta's almost back, and Gamzee and Vriska are right behind her."

"So no vidbots?"

"If we want to save them, we need to do it as soon as possible. Kanaya is staying back to set up a medical bay. Nepeta, Gamzee, and Vriska will be armed to their teeth and in charge of making sure you and KK get to wherever they are safely. You and KK will each have a shopping cart in case Feferi or Eridan are hurt. If Equius can't move, we'll have to escort Kanaya there to help him, he's too big otherwise."

"Sounds like you didn't need my help after all." Terezi pauses a bit and shifts uncomfortably in her chair. "You know it reeks in here, right?"

"Yeah. Sorry about that."

"Sollux, when was the last time you left your room?"

"I met you and Karkat at the back door a couple minutes ago."

She sighs. "You know what I mean. When was the last time you left the Martina?"

"Oh." There's no good way for you to answer this. "About a month ago."

"We've only been here four months! What the heck are you doing in here? And why were you so interested in a freaking community garden, anyways?"

You snap, you're tired and you probably should've eaten something today, but you haven't and your just so angry about everything. About Aradia, and your parents, and now Feferi. You're just trying to help them.

"I'm not, alright! We don't need need anything. We have enough food here to last for another month at least! All of the fucking missions I've been sending you guys on are pointless!"

"Then why the hell have we been doing them?"

"They're distractions to keep you from getting cabin fever! Can you imagine being stuck with Vriska and nothing to do for four months? We'd be worse off than _Tavros_ was in a matter of days!"

"And what do you do while we're gone?" Terezi's tone is still sharp and accusatory.

"Make sure you guys don't die. I talk to a few people online sometimes."

She's stood up and has moved her hands up to your face, feeling your features. Her fingertips press gently into the bags under your eyes. Quietly she asks, "When was the last time you got some sleep?"

"A couple days ago." You're lying. It's been at least a week.

"Well, that settles it!" Terezi's voice has regained its confidence as she turns around sharply and begins walking out of your room. "You need to get out. You're coming instead of Karkat."

"What."

"I'm not letting you hole up n here, Sollux. You need to live a little, kill a few zombies for a change."

"But who'll watch the computers? Plus, I'm the clumsiest person here!"

"Karkat will. _You'll_ be fine."

"You trust Karkat with my computer bank? He'll probably blow it up!"

"Fine, he'll come with us."

"But _then_ who'll help us with directions!" Your voice is edged with triumph. There is nothing that Terezi can make you do without your consent, least of all leaving the Martina.

"Sollux, you are the _smartest_ person I know- memorize the map. No more arguing, and you should probably take a nap so you don't get us all killed. I'll alert the troops." Terezi leaves your room with a haughty saunter reminiscent of your mother's when you had lost.

"God damn it, TZ," you say, but she's gone, gone and there's nothing you can do but turn off the lights and lay down in your sleeping bag and try to sleep.

*

Aradia's face looms over you. She's smiling, happy, alive. You're laughing.

She's laughing.

Then there's a loud noise, a scream, and the two of you are surrounded by fire. Aradia's skin is getting paler and paler. Her teeth are getting sharper and her fingernails disgustingly long. She reaches out her hands, reaching for you, your neck, to kill and eat you.

"Save me, Sollux." Her voice isn't her voice anymore. It's too rough and shaky and wrong, mocking you. It hurts your ears. You're crying, both in your dream and in real life, your pillow damp with tears and choking sobs. "Or don't."

"Join me."

"We can be together again."

"I'll never leave."

"I love you."

"No!" You scream. This is where things aren't always the same- sometimes you break away, run through the fire, away from Aradia only to see Mom and Dad. Sometimes you curl into the fetal position and scream until Aradia surrounds you and there's nothing you can do. Tonight, you're paralyzed standing up, your knees locked, your voice hoarse. "No, no, no. Aradia, no, please."

Tears are streaming down your face.

"Sollux!" It's not Aradia's voice.

"Wake up, Sollux!"

You're groggy and delirious with sleep and you realize you're hugging someone tightly around their waist. You look up to see the face of whoever you're holding captive, blinking through tears. Your vision is blurry from a combination of wet eyes and your lack of glasses, but you're pretty sure it's Karkat.

"Jesus, Sollux, are you okay?" He's quiet for once and calm, stroking your hair a little. The front of his shirt is wet from you crying on it.

"Sorry, KK." You sniffle.

"It's fine, just don't mention it to anyone else."

You're half in your sleeping bag and half hanging on Karkat and you don't want to let go of him. It feels nice and safe and warm in his arms. It reminds you of when you were little. "Why are you here?"

"Terezi said that you hadn't slept for a while. She's out riling everyone up and making plans. I thought that you might be afraid to sleep, like when we were five. The nightmares sure are rough now, huh?"

"Yeah... I can't go to sleep without seeing Aradia."

"...Sorry." You know he isn't just apologizing for the nightmares, but for everything that happened to her and because of her.

"Do you have nightmares, too?"

"We all do, dumbass. Terezi was right, you do need to get out of this room more often."

You ignore him. "What do you dream about?"

Karkat goes quiet. "I dream about my mom and- and shooting her. Over and over and over. It's like it's stuck on loop in my head."

You pause to think about this. Karkat and his mom were really close and it had been hard for her to raise him by herself, but she had made sure he had everything he needed. You loved your parents, but as long as you got good grades and stayed out of trouble they had let you do what you wanted. You never realized how much harder it must of been for Karkat to lose his mom.

You sit up and hug his shoulders.

"You did what you had to. Your mom would be proud of you."

Karkat hugs you back. "Thanks. Now we have some idiots to rescue."

You push him off and laugh. "I'll be out in a second."

You change into a cleaner shirt. One of the flaws of the Martina is that there isn't a place to connect a washing machine to the water supply, even if any of you knew how to. You make a mental note to propose a trip to the laundromat soon.

You take five minutes to memorize the map then you're out the door. Outside the security office everyone is bustling around getting ready. Terezi is leaning against a shopping cart questioning Kanaya on either food and water or how to perform an emergency amputation. You can't get close enough to figure out before Vriska hands you a bat studded with nails and screws, the word '8ruiser' stenciled in blue down the side.

"She's good. With 8ruiser you'll be fine." Vriska smile gruesomely. "You still won't compare with the 8rute and me, though." She pronounces it 'broo-tay,' as in 'et tu,' and you hope that isn't foreshadowing. "Isn't 8rute a babe?"

She's shoved her bat under your nose for you to 'admire' it. 8rute is longer than 8ruiser and deadlier looking, too. All of the nails tilt toward the end and Vriska has wound barbed wire through them. If you were forced to describe it, you'd probably say that it looked like a cone of doomsday cotton candy.

"It's beautiful," you say, unconvincingly. Vriska is undeterred.

"I know, right? Anyways, for you Captor, I'll give you some tips later." She leans close to you and places her hand in the 'no one can hear me because I have a magical sound blocking hand' position. 

"Since the Nitram incident," Vriska whispers conspiratorially. Her breath is sour, but you can't criticize. After all, your hygienic responsibilities have been severely neglected, too. "I've been looking for a new protege."

"We'll see." Then you're walking off, awkwardly holding 8ruiser, looking for someone else to help. You do admit you feel a lot safer than with the shitty pile of shuriken you got in fifth grade when you still like Naruto.

Eventually you find your way to Kanaya's side as she stares at a mess of sleeping bags and first aid supplies. Terezi must have went to help Karkat.

"How's it going?"

"Fine, fine." She sounds distracted and you're just about to leave when she continues on. "I'm just trying to think how this should be set up. If we put the quarantine war in the dairy corner do you think you could manage to turn the fridges back on somehow. For a short time of course, just long enough to make sure they're decontaminated."

"No problem, KN. Do you need some help moving all of this?"

"Actually, I do. Could you bring a couple shopping carts over?"

"On it." You leave, walking to the sliding doors up front where you keep the carts when they aren't being used or raced around in, still holding 8ruiser nonchalantly as possible when you pas Nepeta and Gamzee. 

GZ towers over her by at least a foot. Nepeta's forced to lean back, her arms crossed and a look of anger on her face. Gamzee's lazy grin is edged with something darker. Shit. Gamzee must be sobering up and you remember why no on minds if Gamzee stoned when he's back at the Martina.

"You take that back," Nepeta snarls at him, showing off all of her front teeth.

"Now, lil' sis, don't you think you're offended for no motherfucking reason?"

"Take it _back,_ clown shit."

"Don't worry, babe, I'm sure Equius will still take orders with his motherfucking skin rotting."

"Gamzee." You step between them warily. "Karkat needs to see you."

There's a quick flash of anger in his eyes before he grins, seemingly back to his normal serene self. Nepeta is tense behind you. "Cool, Solbro. I'll go get motherfucking on that."

As he turns his back and begins to walk away, Nepeta relaxes and hugs you from the side. "Thanks Sollux. One of these days I'm going to kill that fucking clown. Don't tell Equius I cussed."

"Sure thing. Help me bring these carts to Kanaya?"

"Okay."

As you begin pushing the carts back across the old store you ask Nepeta, "How did all of that start, anyways?"

"We were talking about them disappearing. I had asked him if he thought they were going to be alright. It was stupid of me. He said that they were going to be fine, at least Eridan and Feferi were. I made him tell me what he meant and he said, he said-" Nepeta's eyes are brimming with tears and you pause in an aisle that still has a couple of sweatshirts, "-he said that Equius was probably dumb enough to take orders from a zombie and kill himself off." She's hiccuping now and you can tell she's really distressed.

"I'm, uh, sorry," you say lamely. You pat her shoulder and she latches onto you tightly, her tears seeping into your shirt. First KK and now NP. You're not going to survive long with this much prolonged human contact. "Gamzee just said that to bug you. Equius isn't going to kill himself. He loves you too much to leave you in such a shitty world."

"Thanks," she says again.

As she eases her hug, you put your hands on her shoulders in your best imitation of fatherly support. "Don't worry. We're going to get your step-brother back."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't edit this chapter as well as I did the first one, so please tell me if you see anything wrong, particularly the verb tenses.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	3. Chapter 3

It takes a while to finally get everyone ready but you’re done by eight. You figure that four hours to make a hospital ward isn’t too bad. 

Everyone’s crowded outside the loading dock waiting for orders. You wait for Terezi even though you could probably give them yourself. She’s a better commander. Keeps dissension out of the ranks and all that.

When you find her, you help her up the step.

“Everybody pipe down!” she yells. “Does everyone have their stuff?” Terezi pauses for people to check themselves and see.

You look around. Everyone other than Kanaya, who’s standing off to the side, is decked out in makeshift armor- knee and elbow pads, shin guards, sport pads, helmets- and holding flashlights. Anyone who’s hands are full from their weapon has a headlight strapped to their forehead. You have three yourself, one in your right hand, one strapped to your upper left arm, and a penlight taped to the back of your left glove.

Karkat takes this time to raise his hand and clear his throat. “Terezi.”

“Yes?”

“It’s getting dark. Not that I don’t think we should rescue them, but shouldn’t we wait until morning? It’s more dangerous at night, and you can barely see anything normally.”

“Well, I’m not going alone, am I?” Terezi sounds annoyed. “Time is of the essence. We’re armed and can handle the zombies but we don’t know what position Eridan, Equius and Feferi are in. Our goal is to find them and return as quickly as possible. Are there any other questions?”

There's a chorus of "no."

“All right!” Terezi calls you back and you snap your head towards her. “Let’s head out!”

Everyone’s pulling on their goggles and masks, safety measures you had deemed necessary at the beginning of the pandemic.

You pull back to talk to Kanaya who’s been watching quietly.

“You’ll be ready?”

“I’ll be ready.”

“Good.” As you’re walking back to rejoin Terezi, Kanaya grabs your arm.

“Good luck.”

“Thanks but tell that to Vriska. Besides, she has it all. Figures that’s why I've never had any. See you soon, KN.”

***

You estimate it will take you about half an hour of walking to get to where Eridan, Feferi, and Equius were. You had thought about taking the bikes you still have sectioned away at the Martina but quickly decided not to. It’s too dark, Terezi’s blind, and there’s six people going but hopefully nine coming back, too awkward. So no bikes.

Ten minutes into the walk you’re beginning to regret it. It’s scarier at night. Most of the streetlamps are out and the few still on leave sallow undertones and disfigured shadows creeping behind you. It’s almost better without the lamps, walking under the thin crescent moon and the flickering view of the flashlights.

Karkat and Terezi are in the middle of the group, each pushing a shopping cart, and Karkat keeps reaching out for Terezi’s hand even though she’s probably best suited out of all of you for a midnight stroll. Gamzee lopes along behind them, and you and Nepeta follow closely behind him. Vriska walks ahead of you all. Nobody talks. Every sound is ominous. Your nerves feel like they’re on fire and each noise startles you.

There’s rustling much closer to you and the six of you instinctively crowd closer together, and inch farther into the middle of the street.

Out from the shadows at the edge of the road lumbers a cat. It’s side has been torn and you catch glimpses of slimy pink from inside it. Momentarily you’re stupefied, on one of the message boards still working someone up north had mentioned zombified animals, but this is the first one you’ve seen.

Quickly, while you’re still struck with a moment of horror, Vriska runs towards the cat raising her bat and then 8rute comes crashing down on it and you can hear it’s spine crack and shatter like a fistfull of dry spaghetti strands. It’s body is bent at a weird angle but not satisfied she stomps her foot into it’s head and grinds it into the asphalt with the toe of her shoe. You think an eye is pushed out somewhere. Nepeta has hers squeezed shut tightly.

“Good going, getting it on your shoes, too,” Karkat says sarcastically though quieter than his usual raucous self.

Vriska breathes sharply out of her nose and rolls her eyes. “You’re welcome. I’m sure at any second you were going to do something about that fucking cat, but I decided I wouldn’t like to die while you were got your wits together.”

“You’re burning those sneakers before we get back to the Martina.”

“Wouldn’t dream of doing otherwise.” Vriska rolls her eyes again and your group moves shakily onwards, leaving behind the mangled remains of the cat.

***

For the next ten or fifteen minutes there are no more disturbances though the little confidence you had before the cat is lost. You jump a little at each noise and secretly suspect that Vriska kicks at rocks on purpose to watch you panic. You wish you were back in your room at the Martina, living vicariously through the computer screens.

You’re just making it onto Main Street, only a couple blocks away from the last spot you know all three of them were together, when the first real zombie gets to you.

You’re more prepared, a combination of having steeled yourself up for this and already killing a multitude of human zombies, but so is Gamzee. You figure the weed must have finally worn all the way off by now, because he moves alarmingly fast, and in an almost hypnotizing series of swings, his clubs knock the zombie’s head askew with a crunch. He swings one more time for good measure and the zombie, what had used to be a middle aged women, keels over.

Gamzee’s turning away already but you’re still looking at the ruins.

“Holy shit, is that Mrs. Gonzales?” you ask. It’s not often that a zombie is someone you know when all the people closest to you have all been dealt with.

“Was,” Karkat corrects grimly.

“Serves her right, that heartless bitch,” Vriska spits. “She failed me.”

“You caught our chemistry station on fire,” Terezi points out.

“That was the whole point of the lab.”

“Are we gonna motherfuckin’ move?” Gamzee is facing you, tapping his foot, and sounds impatient. Not good signs.

As you turns towards him you hear Nepeta.

“Fuck!” She’s right. By some strange psychic property it seems that the Mrs. Gonzales managed to alert all the other zombies where you are and they’re now currently ambling towards you.

You repeat after her. “Fuck.”

There’s at least a dozen of the zombies, shuffling and groaning. They’re still a block away but already Gamzee and Vriska are racing towards them. You curse again and chase after them, your baseball bat raised above your head. You reach a zombie and swing wildly at it. Un8eatable crashes into it’s arm and sticks for a second before you rip it away, along with chunks of bloody ashen skin.

Vriska’s next to you fighting, and without looking she yells, “Aim for the neck, numbskull.”

The second time you swing you try it and your bat connects with the zombies face, pushing it away from you and farther, the neck cracking audibly and its ear catches on a nail and pulls off in a bloody mess.

You feel like you’re going to hurl but there’s already another zombie taking it’s place and you resolve to puke your guts out as soon as you finish rescuing Feferi.

The first swing on Zombie #2 falls a little short and you just clip his jaw, though you can hear the satisfying crunch of it dislocating.

Zombie #2 is on his way back towards you. You raise your bat above your head and take a step closer to him, before bringing the bat down as hard as you can.

His skull shatters and his eyes bulge out as his body crumples to the ground. Zombie #2 no longer poses a threat.

Holding the bat with one hand, you brush your other over your forehead to get your hair out of your face. You briefly think about lifting your goggles to rub the sweat out of your eyes before passing it off as a fucking stupid idea.

You idly survey the area, slowly relaxing your death grip on Un8reakable as you do. Vriska is leaning on 8rute over a sprawled out figure, Gamzee is clobbering one last zombie to second death, and Karkat’s helping Terezi back to the abandoned shopping carts. Nepeta is working her claws out of the heart of a zombie with a grim look on her face. You realize that since this whole ordeal began your friends have become terrifying, each a monster in their own right, and you can’t think of one that’s still around that you would want to meet in a dark alley at night. Then you think that you pretty much are with your friends in a dark alley at night and none of them have beaten the shit out of you yet, though they all have the complete ability to. You’ll have to write yourself a reminder not to piss them off any more than you do.

You look down at yourself and you’re absolutely covered in zombie viscera- guts and flesh and blood. Fuck, this was your favorite shirt before the apocalypse, too, and it’s probably ruined. Your cousin Mituna had gotten it for you, he had always indulged your obsession with bee, making him one of your more loved family members, and you stop thinking about him immediately.

Glancing around, you seriously have to plan that trip to the laundromat.


	4. Chapter 4

You get to the intersection of Main and Carpenter and you tell everyone to spread out but stay within visual contact, and not to check alleys branching off yet.

Main Street’s a wreck- the shops and houses lining the street have no lights and numerous windows are broken. Farther down, the road is covered in branches, and you think that a tree must have fallen down during the huge storm a week or so ago. Despite remaining in your room, you still heard the deep rumble of thunder, and later Karkat had told you that the lighting couldn’t have been more than a few miles off. After the storm, you and your friends had spent at least a day clearing debris from around the back lot of the Martina, and Terezi had personally made sure that you helped with the manual labor. In the end, you’re pretty sure Equius still did at least 25% of the work, but the fact that you went outside at all has to count for something.

You peer into the dark gaping maw of a busted window, what you think you used to be a jewelry store.

“FF?” you call out gently. Nothing moves in the darkness and nothing makes a sound, except for your friends searching behind you. You swear and kick a piece of glass.

“Guys!” Nepeta yells and you turn, blindly hoping that Feferi is with her. She’s not of course.

Nepeta’s across the street and closer to the fallen trees than to you. You run to her and pray she found something useful. When you get there, her face is furrowed in concentration, like she’s trying not to cry. In her hand is a blue bag and she looks at you, eyes wide behind her goggles as everyone else crowds around.

“It’s Equius’s,” she explains. “He uses it to hold important things.” She dumps the contents into her palm. By the light of the flashlights you see one gunmetal grey, one rich purple, and one glittery pink earbuds.

“Those are their communicators,” you say, stunned. That explains why they weren’t answering. “Nepeta, where did you find this?”

“In the mailbox,” she explains, gesturing behind you. “When we were younger, and Equius babysat me and the other kids on our street, he’d leave me notes in our mailbox that said where everyone was hiding during hide-n-seek.” Nepeta glances up at you and pauses before quietly, almost guiltily asking, .“What if they’re not in danger and just left?”

Everyone’s staring at you, and you can tell that you have the beginnings of a migraine because you can feel the buzz behind your eyes.

“No,” you say firmly, though you aren’t too sure. It would be easy for them to jack a car and abandon ship.

“No,” you repeat yourself, “they wouldn’t leave. Equius wouldn’t leave you here. They’re just stuck somewhere, we’ll find them.” You trying to to reassure everyone, including yourself. This is not happening again. You refuse to believe it.

You gesture to Karkat to comfort Nepeta some more, while you turn to the mailbox.

“Everybody, fan out from here. I’ll be right back.”

Karkat snaps his head up from Nepeta and glares at you.

“Captor, you shitsack cake sniffer, what the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“Going to BP. I need water and advil. Why the fuck didn’t we think to bring water. Next time we’re bringing water. You want anything?”  
“No I don’t, dick maggot, but you’re insane if you think you’re going by yourself.” Karkat pauses as he looks around the group, assessing each person. “Vriska, go with him.”

You snort. The chances of you dying tonight just quadrupled, twice, in quick succession. Vriska beats you to comment though. “What, Mama Vantas? Don’t think little Captor can handle his own without a sitter?” She turns to you, and you swear her good eye glints under her goggles. “Come on, Sollux, let’s go wreck some shit.”

You roll your eyes. “I’ll bring everyone back some water.”

Karkat nods before he takes over, shouting at everyone to stop shitting themselves in idiot induced ecstasy and start searching. You’re relieved to be out of your leadership position for the moment when you and Vriska slip away.

BP’s a block from the mailbox where Nepeta found Equius’s bag. You start for it in a jog but slow as Vriska starts laughing.

“Jesus, Sollux, you’re killing me.” You narrow your eyes at her but still walk beside her.

“Let’s just do this quickly so we can get back to looking for them.”  
“Doubt it matters.”

You stop suddenly. “What’s that supposed to mean?”  
Vriska keeps walking, and kicks a branch across the street, before replying. “They’re either alive or dead, at this point. They’re alive, we rescue them, whoop-dee-doo, if they’re dead, we kill them again.” She swipes at the air with 8rute for emphasis. “You know... a preemptive strike.”

You jog again to catch up with her. “What?”  
“Kill them, before they kill us. Did you know that zombies have residual memory? Just enough to go back to where they remember people being and eat their friends.”  
God you need that advil. “How the heck do you know this?”

“Uh.” Vriska kicks another piece of rubble. She continues more brashly, “You aren’t the only one who can find a decent internet connection every once in awhile. Shit, Captor, you seriously believe that they’re completely okay, don’t you? Prepare for the worst, you know. I still can’t figure out how you chumps made it this far without me in charge. Who put you in management in the first place? Might have to stage a coup on your skinny ass.”

You look nervously at her bat. Shit, you knew that was a bad sign. “I’ve told you guys, like, ten times that they’re more than likely okay. How do you keep forgetting? It’s like everything I say is the keys you leave on the kitchen counter to your symbolic mind car but you just can’t find because your mind car’s running on a empty tank.”

Vriska laughs again. Her laughs remind you of someone suffering from hacking cough, and has always made you want to punch her. “Well, I suppose you have to stay optimistic after what happened to the last one. Wouldn’t do for you to lose two to none on the ‘apocalypse vs. your girlfriend’ game show, huh Captor?”

“Feferi and I aren’t dating- and you’re one to talk, after what you did to Tavros. At least I didn’t kill her!”

“I didn’t kill Tavros!” Vriska sounds genuinely hurt and also more than a little pissed.

“You might as well have,” you spit out venomously, and you’re sure Vriska is furious. Fuck. You’re practically in a dark alley and Vriska was going to pound the shit out of you. You were just thinking that you should be more careful, and then you go invoking the rage of a girl who names her bat after a man who stabbed his best friend in the chest. Good going, Caesar, do you have a death wish?

When you finally do look at Vriska, she doesn’t look angry, just... sad? Bitter? Disappointed? She pulls her mask away from her mouth and spits on the ground. Then she shrugs, kicking a rock. “What can I say? You try to help someone be the best they can be and they repay you by dying. Life’s a bitch, get over it.” Despite her words, Vriska sounds sorry and you’re not sure what to say. Luckily you don’t have to.

BP has definitely seen better days. The lot is covered in debris, rocks, branches, papers blown from across town, and several of the windows are broken inwards. One of the sliding doors is completely off its track and has several large cracks running through the glass.

“Great, all the hard work’s been done for us,” Vriska says, smiling. She still hasn’t replaced her mask, but she seems to have recovered from the fact that the two of you had just crossed into delicate emotional territory. It seems that she’s ready to let the whole thing drop, though.

You shine a beam of light into the store. It looks empty save for a shelves that were emptied onto the floor. Vriska’s already ducking through the door.

You follow in behind her and head straight for the fridges in back.

“Can you grab me a plastic bag?” you ask her.

“Sure. Get me a pepsi while you’re back there.”

“Gross. You know they’re all going to be expired by now, right?”

“They’re all artificial. There’s nothing in them that can go bad.”

“Fine.” You pick up ten bottles of water and a pepsi, and holding them awkwardly in your arms, head up to the counter. Vriska’s behind it, leaning next to the cash register.

“That’ll be $8.88, sir,” she says with a bored air about her, pantomiming scanning the water bottles. “Cash or credit?”  
You stare at her blankly and she finally tells you it’s on the house and to lighten up, have some fun. Then something over your shoulder catches her eyes.

“Captor,” she hisses, like she was just let in on a huge, amazing secret. “The AA must not have found this place before the zombies got to them. There’s still a shit ton of beer here!” You turn to look behind you and she’s right. “Let’s get drunk!”

“No.” Your head is going to kill you. Better find the advil quick.

“Fine, but after all this crap we’re coming back here and getting wasted. You don’t get out at all from what I hear. You need a field trip.”

You groan. “What makes you think that I would make a good drinking buddy?”

“I bet you’d be hilarious! Besides, Terezi’s joined at the hip with Karkat and there’s no fucking way I’m getting shitfaced in front of him. Plus getting drunk by yourself isn’t fun, just sad and depressing. It’s like that one saying, how does it go? ‘If a stoner does drugs alone, do they really make any crazy yet hilarious revelations’?”

You don’t bother to correct her as you look across the counter for Advil, and Vriska continues on. “I bet Kanaya could hold her own, though.”

You mumble a reply as you find a bottle. You open some water and swallow two of the pills. You finish half of the water, while Vriska keeps on about different aspects of drinking culture. You figure you might as well grab a couple more water bottles, because it feels like you’ll need them.

When you return, Vriska’s still behind the counter, but is now stuffing packs of cigarettes into the pockets of her cargo pants.

“What are you doing?” The throbbing in your head has not yet faded and you’re nervous about what effects her answer will have on your precarious mental state.

“There’s no point letting these go to waste.” Vriska stuffs a lighter into her pocket for good measure.

“You’re going to kill yourself,” you protest weakly.

Vriska looks at you and smirks. “Don’t worry. When I come back I’ll go straight for Terezi.”

You digest this for a moment. In the end, you decide that your head still hurts too much to care at right now. “No smoking in or around the Martina, and don’t let KK see or he’ll kill you before the cigarettes have a chance.”

Karkat’s mom had smoked. He tried to get her to stop, again and again, but it was the one thing she couldn’t do for him.

Vriska looks slightly annoyed as if she can’t believe all of the constraints you’re placing on her, but agrees anyways.

“Anything else you want while we’re here?” Vriska shrugs and then stalks around the store like a lion trying to choose its prey.

“Here, catch.” You fumble with what she throws to you before catching it. You bring the package up to your eyes to see what it is in the dim lightning. It turns out to be a Little Debbie’s Honey Bun, the type that was only fifty cents despite being huge.

Vriska stares at you expectantly as she walks back up to the front of the store.

“Okay,” you say, taking off your mask, “we can have a picnic.” Vriska grins triumphantly. “But then we have to get back and find FF.”

The two of you both end up sitting on the counter, eating the stale rolls in companionable silence. Then you stand up and dust the crumbs off of your front. It’s about time to see what trouble everyone got up to without your supervision.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry. For everything. This chapter goes to prove that waiting longer does not make things any better. In this chapter I tried to really get the character's voices and stuff right and I don't think I did it successfully, and I'm just having a rough time in general and I apologize.
> 
> I also just started an actual writing blog on tumblr, in case you'd like to follow me there at mabeldair.tumblr.com.

**Author's Note:**

> One of my New Year's resolutions is to start posting more of the stuff I make and I thought I'd get a head start. I haven't actually read any of the other zombiestuck aus, (other than Where it is Warm by technicolorCarbon which is also tons better than this, guaranteed), so you'll have to tell me how this compares.
> 
> Comments and corrections are more than welcome, I'm sure I've missed some mistakes, so please don't be shy. & Just a reminder I am on tumblr as mwahahachoke if you want to message me there, too.


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